Is it just me?

I am curious to know if anyone out there has thought about our economy. I guess you could consider me a graduate, or what sounds much better, a recent graduate and I am still frantically trying to find my place in the job market. I am hesitant to be loyal to companies because I watched Enron and the demise of accounting firms, who helped such scoundrels, in its wake. It is even more impossible to have gainful employment due to the disruption of the market. Those fired, layed off or pushed from their jobs who were older and more established are now taking the entry-level jobs from the new graduates. I don't see how anyone could miss these disparities. I and others in my generation are quite possibly looking at never having a traditional career or maybe my generation will be the generation that defines the new definition of "career." Due to the upheavals in recent years, will "career" be defined as "continuous job to job prospects," never settling into one career? Will we really fill out the "jack of all trades, master of none" saying not because we wouldn't have liked to master a career but because the opportunity never presented itself? Will we never settle into a career because by the time the opportunity presents itself we will be well into our mid to late thirties? Mid to late thirties would have been the hey-day of some of our parents career. At this age we might just be beginning our careers. This is a travesty. I have even heard from some well-read people that in some statistical data McDonald's grill cooks are considered manufacturing jobs in order to beef up the numbers. The Boy Scouts of America is in trouble for padding their membership roles. And some are saying they do this because their directors are under intense stress to get offices up and running. I mean really "Boy Scouts of America!" I feel as if we are living in the outfall of the 80's. Maybe we are returning to the 80's. Maybe the 90's were really the 80's revisited and never learned. Maybe we are going back. Either way what I am well aware of is my day-to-day struggle of job-hunting. I have two degrees and find myself consistently placed into the "overqualified" bin. I don't know if these jobs are looking for loyalty and in that way think I won't stay. Someone needs to discuss the "new environmental definition" of loyalty to human resources. I find it hard that a generation who has grown up seeing such job instability will ever find the loyalty of baby boomers. I mean seriously, the baby boomers are shaking in their boots trying to hold onto their jobs. They are just praying they can keep their jobs until they decide to retire. I find no loyalty in shaking in my boots. I don't see that a person who has less then a college education would find loyalty in this job market. Just because they don't have a college education doesn't mean they are stupid or that they feel like they are so beholden to a company that they would risk their retirement and life investments. Maybe someone can explain to me what their thoughts are on a somewhat "back-on-track" job market. I am only starting to express my frustrations.

You can't afford it anyway

I haven't posted in a while but I thought I might lay down a few lines before the 13th expires. As of today, many frustrations have cropped up, passed and had to be physically thrown away. I am finding that the bull***t is getting harder and harder to deal with! I often feel like it is me, myself and I standing alone in a world of people who have no clue as to their identity. In the same breath I must ask if I am the one who is ultimately fooled. What is the use of foolish thoughts? I mean I live in a world of mediocre talent at best. It seems no one excels and therefore those who have the power look for no one who excels. This seems to be the constant circle of mediocrity. Absolute mediocrity. Doesn't anyone else see this but myself?! It is a shame when in today's time Alicia Keys is the symbol of a pianist and Ashley Simpson (probably spelled her name wrong) is a pop star. I don't mean to pick on these two but, they were the first two to pop in my mind. Not that Ashley is so wrong, it is just that her brand of talent is something that most of them have. How many more most we endure? Now as far as I am concerned, I don't listen to the radio so what people find interesting about them doesn't bother me. Other then the fact that whenever I turn on the radio they are shoved down my throat, no one is making me listen to them. But just for the sake of knowledge - these are the stars of the young world. I suppose those who are truly talented have never been able to catch the real break but now more then ever. How did we get so far away? Club rap is considered exclusively Hip Hop as if the golden days, the building blocks of Hip Hop are golden oldies - something to be dusted off and played every now and then. When did we get so far away from linear progression. Instead of a linear forward progression we seem to be going in hyper speed having completely jumped the channel. Category mistakes are the norm. We expect them from politics to recreation. There are WMD's!"/ "Oh! No there aren't" - "I know I'm on Saturday Night Live but my band messed up." /"Oh! It wasn't the band it was my throat, everyone has these problems!"(paraphrasing Ashley Simpson). When did it become second nature to never get it right?! When did it become second nature to pick style over substance? Sure, in the entertainment industry things like this have always been going on for some time but some say that art should imitate life. I don't know. Maybe it should be a balance. However now, life absolutely imitates art and popular art is based upon a few, seemingly wealthy people's thought on what life is. If you look around and your life is nothing like what you see on television. That's reality. That's life. Stop squeezing life into a glass box expecting the box not to break. Life dictates: "If you break it, you buy it." And You can't afford it anyway.

Paul Mooney @ WBLS

I just wanted to let everyone know that Paul Mooney will be on the morning show for WBLS. This is the same radio station in New York that Wendy Williams is on so it should be entertainment all day. I believe it started today 1/03/05. I am personally excited being that most of the comics I love ( Richard Pryor, Eddie Murphy, Dave Chappelle) and the shows I watched and watch if I am to include Chappelle's Show, he was a ghostwriter. So just letting all know that tidbit of information.

Masculine Women: Not what U think

Is it just me or is the definition of outward femininity changing? If I were to look at any history book or ancient archaeological book, or historical film/TV media, I think I would find an image of femininity that is round or curvy in some way. Now, femininity in pop culture is defined by exactly the opposite. I don't know exactly when it began to change (maybe with Twiggy), but now the popular picture of a feminine woman seems to be a woman that looks like a skinny man or an adolescent child. I think it no strange coincidence that in Elizabethan times, at least in Shakespearean plays women were played by adolescent boys. I would appreciate it if someone who is more knowledgeable on this subject would explain why that was the case. For now, I don't exactly know what that meant. Did it mean that men on top of thinking women had certain skills that were unmatchable to their own, also felt like women were so inadequate that they couldn't even play themselves? Whatever the reason, in the present day I find it troubling that as a woman a certain identity is being stripped. I mean I knew that I had added another step to becoming a woman when I looked in the mirror and saw that I had hips. Hips are a trait that makes a woman indistinguishable along with breasts. If a man were to want to become a woman those are seemingly two curves that would need to outwardly exist, breasts and hips. What is it now that any man if wanting can outwardly become a woman so easily? Don't you think it should be a little work to make that feat happen. I mean looking at the women today. They boast no curves. They are stringy with either absolutely no breasts or absolutely too big, surgically altered breasts and no hips. Their makeup is caked on so it is not like there is any other natural trait left to distinguish a woman from a man. I guess the only things left in distinguishing are the Adams Apple and big hands and feet, maybe? I just wonder if these words ever cross anyone's mind: "Is that a transvestite or a woman I am looking at?"
Now, onto something else that has been intriguing me. If it is becoming harder and harder to distinguish women from transvestite men, what does this say about the desires of men who buy into pop culture? In today's society does this mean that men desire men-looking women or men? I mean I am just asking. Most times after I explain my line of thinking most men absolutely deny it but how couldn't they, I think? If most women that are being sold to the public look like adolescent boys or girls or transvestite men and this image is an image that men seem to like, then these men could most probably and do, seemingly, desire a man (or at least not a historic or ancient idea of femininity that consists of curves and/or roundness). I am just looking at an aspect of gender bending. Do you agree or disagree?